An independent magazine aimed at bringing the works of the young and talented
to the whole world. Believing in ideas, thoughts and concepts, Garde Magazine
follows the principle of simplicity and honesty.

Founders
Cleo Tse

cleo.tse@gardemagazine.com

Natasha Chan

natasha.chan@gardemagazine.com

Copy Editor
Marie-JosĂŠe Kelly

mariejosee.kelly@gardemagazine.com

Creators
Gabrielle Tam
Rex Koo

Lyfeik
Ting Ting Cheng

Contributors
David Madsen

david.madsen@gardemagazine.com

Special thanks
Evangelous Androutsopoulos

Karl Ă&#x2013;stgĂĽrd

Peter Bellamy

Nice Gallery

Editorial
We admit this has actually been the most
challenging issue we have had so far.
We are not talking about creators – they are very
good (as usual). It’s more about the difficulties on
our side since it has been a very busy month and
we have nearly made it to a year of publishing!

from issue 1 and 2) who have received help from
a close “pal,” Rebekah Kim. To continue, we have
Nice Gallery from issue 10 who introduces one of
their resident artists, Peter Bellamy. David the movieholic also shares his review of Under The Skin, a
creepy movie starring Scarlett Johansson.

We would like to reserve the surprise of
our one-year anniversary of Garde Magazine for
later – who likes a spoiled surprise? We shan’t be
party poopers.

What’s more, we’ve got a 101 class on
comic strip writing through an actual comic story
- writing and drawing included so you can learn as
you read!

In the mean time, we hope you are going to
enjoy our very Asian-Pacific issue this month. Out
of four fabulous creators, three are from Hong
Kong and one is from Australia. (We are not entirely sure about the term “Asian-Pacific,” but it should
be correct unless Wikipedia is lying… and if they
are lying the error is less our fault…?)
In this issue we are proud to present Gabrielle Tam, creator of Onion Peterman studio featured on the front cover. We also have Ting Ting
Cheng who focuses on painting and who shares
a studio with Gabrielle. We have Rex who is very
experienced in graphic design and who has made
2D and 3D works.
We have also got Lyfeik, an independent
record label formed by Felipe and Uriel (creators

…Are you reading
this?

Testing, testing!

Anyway, let’s not waste any more of your
precious time when it could be spent looking at art.
So flip through now! Go on…you know you want
to.
And happy reading!
Cleo & Natasha

CONTENT
Gabrielle Tam //
Printmaking
Breaking barriers to do what you love

Gabrielle Tam - When I am frustrated
When I am frustrated is my first zine. I have a habit from high school, when I am frustrated or feel uninspired, I will make doodles
that match my feelings. I collected all those desperate little sketches and print them into a small little zine.

What is it about modest artists that grab your attention?
Why do you feel like you want to take more time to understand, get to know and appreciate their work? Is it because
you realise they are just an ordinary person (like you and me),
trying to reach for their dreams? Is it the fact that they can
still manage to be ever so humble when clearly their work
deserves much more credit than they ask for?
Gabrielle Tam from Hong Kong creates silkscreen
prints and illustration. She enjoys making “zines” (little
magazines) and drawing silly things. “I loved art since I was
young. I enjoyed Japanese manga and loved watching a TV
show called ‘Art Attack,’” she said. She’s also absolutely
humble.
She described herself as being “slow to warm up”
and “mildly socially awkward,” which was not the impression Garde Magazine got when we met her. “Most of
the time I am ashamed of my art, but sometimes I am
proud,” she added. “I am bad at using words to express
myself and because my part-time work is teaching children, I think (and sometimes act) like a child.”
Gabrielle’s dream job was always something
artsy. As a child, she wanted to be a painter, artist

When I was in secondary school, I wanted to
be an ‘interesting person.’
I guess I am a very simple
person who doesn’t think
too much about the things
in life but just tries to do
the things that I want to
or cartoonist. “

do,” she said.
Studying visual art at Hong Kong Baptist University, Gabrielle was constantly painting. She only started illustrating and silkscreen printing after she graduated. “I never thought I would quit
creating things because it is the only thing I can do. I get inspired
by things and people around me,” she said.
It was during her studies abroad which led to her interest
in illustration. “At university, I joined an exchange programme in
my second year and took an illustration course in the University
of West of England in Bristol for one semester. Although one
semester is a short period of time, it was long enough for me to
realise illustration was the type of art I wanted to make,” she said.
“Since then, I decided to start a screen printing studio for my
illustrations called Onion Peterman.”
Onion Peterman
Onion Peterman is Gabrielle’s “solo illustration and screen
printing studio,” she said. If you come by any of her works, this
is the trademark she uses rather than her real name. “The name
was originally made up by me and my brother. We were thinking about band names and thought this could be a good name,
but since we never formed a band I used it to name my studio
instead,” she said.
After graduating from university, Gabrielle started Onion
Peterman. “I learned the very basics of screen printing during
university. After that, I researched a lot on YouTube, got
myself a flood light and bought cheap supplies from Taobao.
com (an equivalent to E-bay in the China market),” she said.
“I started with a simple set up for my printing station. Even
now, after two years, I only have one handmade exposure
unit.”
At the beginning, Gabrielle sold her printed postcards, stickers and tote bags at handicraft markets around
Hong Kong. “But after I thought my printing skills were

Gabrielle Tam - Be Brave
Be Brave is a short story about a boy who is afraid of swimming in the pool. I made this mostly because I wanted to make
this one-page format chapbook. The zine can be opened to view the complete picture on both sides.

good enough, I started making zines and now I make art
prints,” she said.
Her work
Gabrielle
describes her work as lost,
spontaneous and imperfect:
Lost
“Lost is always the
first feeling I get when I start
drawing. Most of my ideas
are inspired from boring and
confused days, when I am
not sure what to do. After I
graduated from university, I
decided not to find a full-time
job and spend time on my
artwork instead. It was scary.
It is still scary that I am on a
path so different from most
of the graduates in the city.
There are no more teachers
to give me assignments; there
are no schedules and deadlines for my art projects. All
I can do is draw whatever I
can think of and that’s how I
start creating things.”
Gabrielle went against
a social norm in Hong Kong
where it is viewed as normal
for students to seek for a job
that earns as much money as
possible after graduation. She

broke through a social barrier
because she insisted on doing
what she loves, even if it
might not always pay.
Spontaneous
“Since I am not a
very disciplined person, I
don’t have a timetable for my
art. I just make what I can
think of. My ideas are always
spontaneous - it could be one
interesting stranger I saw on
the street or something that
I saw online. When an idea
comes up, I will work right
away before I lose my interest
in the idea. That’s why most
of my projects are short and
silly.”
Imperfect

I think I
have many flaws
in my work, to
the point that
imperfection
has become my
strong point.
All of my artworks are made
“

with inadequate
printing facilities and most
of my ideas in
my artworks are
brief and silly.

However, I am too conscious
of these flaws that I try to
learn every time I fail. Every
zine I make is a new drawing
and printing technique I want
to try out.”
One of the personal
barriers Gabrielle faces in
her line of work is a lack of
confidence because she is so
modest. Creating art for oneself is difficult, but creating
art for other people to see
is an entirely different story
because the flaws one sees in
their works can be endless.
Artists are required to break
through such barriers if they
want to show their work to
the world and it’s no easy
task.
The process
Gabrielle currently
shares her art studio with five
other friends (oil painters) in
an industrial building. “Our

studio
is quite
messy with
lots of canvases in various sizes.
Outside the window is
a small hill where you can
see a little waterfall that forms
during rainy days. Sometimes stray
cats also walk past the window,” she
said.
Although it sounds like she has found
herself the perfect working environment, she also
enjoys working at home. “I mostly make sketches and create
hand drawn/ digital films at home and then I bring the films to my
studio, make the silkscreen stencil and print my work there.”
“I always make really bad sketches and have really bad ideas at the beginning,
so I spend one week to develop the ideas from my brain to start making drafts. After the
draft is settled, I will then work on the colours, since colour separation is very crucial to screen
printing. Developing the idea and getting the film done take more time than the printing,” she said.

The local art scene
“Hong Kong has always been an international art market,” said Gabrielle. “We have Art
Basel every March, where masterpieces are sold here with high prices. However, I think people are
starting to shift their focus to the more local and affordable side of the creative scene.
“From the blooming handicraft market to zine exhibitions, creators and viewers enjoy the
art they are making and the art they can afford. I am always happy to see more kinds of art and I
hope that we can make good quality art even with the harsh social phenomenon in the city,” she
said. “In Hong Kong, space is very limited and rent is crazily high. Young and emerging artists
have very little opportunity to get a proper space for creating art.”

Having good connections is very
important. I am always too shy and
I have little social skills, but I am
learning slowly,
“

” added the humble artist. We hope Gabrielle will

continue breaking through any barriers that obstruct her from showing her works –
whether personal, social or environmental.
We also hope no creator will doubt themselves or
their abilities to create wonderful art!

The
visually
impactful
dreamer
Rex Koo

Graphic Design

Rex Koo
Only You Can Take Me 取西經
My first illustration zine. The zine contain most of my favorite scenario of 70-90s Hong Kong movie.

“You have to
love design and
create. When
you really love it,
you will never be
tired of it. You
won’t even calculate how much
you earn and lose
because you are
already satisfied
from the process
of creating.”

and Dr. Martens, to name a few.

Meet Rex Koo, a full-time Hong
Kong graphic designer satisfying his own
principles as a creator and that of his commercial clients.

As a creator, Rex is not an exception of thinking in a visual way. He likes to
think by the way he sees: giving shapes and
forms to texts or abstract ideas.

“The biggest difference between
creating for me and creating for commercial brands is who to satisfy. For the former
one is satisfying my thoughts and concepts
while the latter one means clients’ ideas
come first,” Rex said.

“I like the impact of visual language,” he said.

He has done commercial works for
famous brands such as Nike, Shu Uemura

Rex explained that being a graphic
designer in the real world is not only about
passion in creating, but also about problem
solving.
“I am happy that I have chosen
graphic design as my occupation. It is
very good training for problem solving. I
persist on designing on my own because

I want a large
extent of freedom, which
breeds all
kinds of good
works
.”

Choosing graphic design came naturally to Rex after he graduated from university.
He explored further into his creativ-

ity with different medium and styles
such as vector graphics, grids, hand
drawing and woodblocks. And without
a doubt, he loves them all.
“The reason why I create with
different materials and styles is because
I love them,” said Rex. “Using hands
to create is like flying in the sky, while
using a computer is similar to driving
a well-equipped racecar on a highway both are interesting and exciting.”
He added that the continuation
of doing vector graphics would desensitize him in terms of creativity, which
is why he tried something new.
Most creators have their own
signature and personal characteristics
inserted in their works, but Rex cares
very little about that.

“I don’t really care about
creative style.
The thing
I care most
for is how to
solve problems and try
new possi-

Rex Koo - Simple People - Hitchcock
Simple People is a series of portrait created under the
principle of „Simplify“ and „Symbolic”. Taking music
and film icons as subjects, I’ve re-renders these famous
faces to simple graphic perfection.

bilities. I think
being over conscious to unify
creative style
will formalise
works,”
he said.

“I try not to think anything about
styles. I think styles are something that will
be conveyed naturally. They reflect one’s personality, morality, value and also aesthetics.
Works with intentional styles will have no
depth,” he added.
Rex is planning to publish his own
comic book in two to three years - his dream
project.

Getting our feet back on the ground,
Rex has some realisation from younger fellow creators who are trying to be a full-time
creator:
“I found out that quite a lot of fellows or design students aren’t really in love
with design. They mostly think about how
to make money, while falling in love with
design is the most basic thing.”
And he knows exactly what he is
in love with. He knows it so well that he

I have
no ultimate goal
as a creator. I
love surprises.
isn’t even goal-oriented. “

”

The
details
of life
Ting Ting Cheng

Painting

Quitting her full-time job and
dedicated to being a creator, Ting Ting
Cheng, the locally born and raised girl
pursues her artistic career in such a hasty
city where no one has time to pay attention to the details in life.
The one-year graduate shares a
studio with a few other artists to achieve
her creative dream. “It has just been a few
months since I quit my full-time job as a
graphic designer. I might have dedicated
my time fully as an artist, but 70% to 80%
of my time is not on art-making but art
administration and all trivial tasks.”
Ting Ting has foreseen the difficulties of being a full-time artist as it is
never easy. “I think the utmost obstacle
is to sustain art-making and living at the
same time. Freelance plus part-time jobs
still occupy most of my time while research and development of my works are
insufficient.”

Although she has to spend most
of her time on making a living, she has
trained her observation in daily life and
put it into her creativity. The 23-year-old
creator loves to pay attention to unnoticed details that everyone misses out.
To Ting Ting, each individual
owns a distinct way of behaviour and
habit therefore life experience gives her
inspiration. Technology nowadays has
flooded everyone with text and images
while delicate facets are overlooked.
However, she found the details
boring.

“Indeed I
think most of the

Ting Ting Cheng - Receptionist

unnoticed details are
not really interesting.
They are sometimes
neutral but quite often empty.”
“For instance, I once captured a receptionist
in the lobby of a commercial building. She looked
merely empty. I mean what else could she express
besides hospitality in her position? She is not supposed to express her inner feelings when she is on
duty. So, I usually find these characters poetic and
even cinematic in their own settings.”
In Ting Ting’s works, human beings are the
most frequently appeared theme. Apart from her
observation, the instincts within humans fascinate
her the most. “Humans are diverse in terms of
gestures, facial expressions and interactions with
others.”
Interestingly enough, when one sees Ting
Ting, one can feel the brightness and light-heartedness expressed from her personality. She would
also describe herself “fascinated by unmarked life
details with a sense of humour.” Yet, looking at her
work, it doesn’t really give a feeling that she is “fascinated” neither “with a sense of humour” since the
colours and expressions she has given are dark and
heavy.

Ting Ting Cheng - Simulator Cinema

“I think it is dark humour…
sceneries I have depicted are absurd
sometimes, so it could not be clearly
and concretely expressed. I will also
transfer a particular image to something abstract in order to strengthen
the darkness and absurdity.”
Ting Ting explained her work
Forever Promoters as an example –
people who gave out leaflets on the
streets have no individual and independent identities. What defined them
are the promotional materials they are
carrying with.
“I would say tones and feelings
are sometimes heavy in my works as
to express the pointless phenomena I
have observed in life,” said Ting Ting.
She also described her works as “subtly
expressive” because she has a lot of feelings to express but she has chosen not
to show them in an exaggerated way.
For her future project, Ting Ting
is going to create a new set of paintings
and also her zine – Month is Stone Day
is Long which is a quarterly publication
which mostly involves drawings.
Garde Magazine loves to ask creators two questions: what do you want
to create the most? And what is your
ultimate goal as a creator? Ting Ting’s

answers are very direct:

“Nice paintings!
I want to create
artworks that show
the greatest depth
of abstractions, like
emotions and
ambience. We are
unable to name
or describe them
while they are
actually very
intimate between
individuals and
deserve more care.”

“I think good paintings / drawings will speak to each of the viewers
and recall their souls. That’s roughly
what I would like to achieve.”

Lyfeik is an independent and very special
record label. It is formed by three unique
people with an interesting principle that
does not follow typical music industry
conventions: they refuse to play in venues
that serve alcohol and strive to do the world
good through their music.

G: How did you all come together?
F: I was making music with a few artists
first then I met Uriel and asked if he wanted to join us. After that, we did pretty well
with various projects. Rebekah is the one
who moulded everything together.
R: I am the newbie in the group. They were
in the group way back.
U: She is the one who got our asses in gear.

Garde Magazine invited the creators from
issue 1 and 2, Uriel Calderon and Felipe
Cea, who are members of Duofox to tell us
about their progress in the music world. We Later on, Garde Magazine finds out Rebekah is
have also got Rebekah Kim with us, the one actually Felipe’s girlfriend.
who “moulded everything together.”
G: How would you define the music
G: Garde Magazine / F: Felipe Cea / U: style of Lyfeik?
Uriel Calderon / R: Rebekah Kim
R: We have actually come up with a genre
called Melange Bounce since we could not
G: What does “Lyfeik” mean?
categorise Lyfeik accurately…
R: It means life + music, right?
F: I would say we are much more rooted
F: A fusion of both. Uriel actually came up in hip hop and electronica but I tend to
with the name.
be very diverse and also scientific in terms
U: There was one night Felipe and I were
of sounds, which means we are very exthinking about how to call a blog where we
perimental. Our sounds tend to
post things about fashion, music and art.
Then I said let’s combine life and music.
be happy, mysterious and
R: People have trouble pronouncing it
nostalgic…but also futuristic
though…
U: It does sound a bit like German.
with old sounds of yester-

year. Uriel knows better.

U: I grew up in a very open-minded house
with Caribbean and traditional Latino background roots, so my love for music was like
an inclusive buffet that contains a bit of this
and that.
G: What is everyone’s role in the group?
F: I would say I write all the music, mix it
and master it. I also refine the product for all
the artists at the moment.
U: Well I am the publicist, networker brushing shoulders with people who can help us
be exposed further.
R: I just do everything else that’s not music
basically – spill over here and there.
G: So Rebekah doesn’t know anything about
music?
R: Not really.
F: She’s being humble.
R: Okay maybe a little… our dynamics is
pretty chilled and easy going. Everyone just
does what’s the best for the label without
being told what to do.
G: What’s the biggest difficulty for the
label so far?
F: Time, without a doubt. Also funding,
since we are independent. It’s a tough business.
R: I agree.
U: Time and money, most of the time.
F: But we love what we do and we take it
seriously.
R: Making pretty things does cost money. It
would be great if we could get support for
the things we love.
The word “HATS” popped up from Felipe all of

a sudden, which led to the most interesting question
Garde Magazine has prepared to ask.
G: Who is the most difficult person to
work with?
U: I can say it would be Felipe and I.
R: Felipe wants to get his artistic hands on
everything. He is planning to have hats produced for the label. It is a logistical nightmare for me. But hey, it’s cool.
F: We all have our downfalls here and
there… Uriel and I are from the ghetto-like
part in Sydney so we tend to be broke as a
joke.
U: Rather than “person,” it’s actually “timing” that is the most difficult thing since we
all have different schedules of life and inspiration. For example, when Felipe has some
cool thoughts, I might not have the right
lyrical narrative for the emotion of the beat.
R: I was going to say these boys are troublemakers. I like structure and order, while these
two like going into their own creative spaces,
VERY OFTEN. It is pretty funny seeing us
at a meeting.
G: What is the most interesting experience Lyfeik has had so far?
R: Finding random people to know more
about our music.
F: Establishing our mark on digital distribution and also getting live performance ready
for events.
U: Meeting more interesting people who love
music, art and creativity. Finding out how to
manifest ideas of our label.
Hmm… pretty much the same answer.
G: What has been your biggest argument so

far?
R: At the moment we are disagreeing about
hats.
U: I need no hat I have an Afro.
F: It isn’t.
Seriously?
F: Here is one: I refuse to play in venues
that provide alcohol. I am against drugs and
alcohol and I also refuse to promote it.
R: I agreed that to do good (moral good) is
definitely the philosophy of Lyfeik. But at
the same time, from a business perspective,
such a limit could be somewhat damaging
during the establishing phases of the label.
U: It is a challenge that makes us able to set
us apart from other labels for sure.
F: I think most of the music over the last
century has promoted those…
R: It’s also beneficial to keep an open mind
to some things. I think nothing is black and
white.
U: Meanwhile I am an anarchist and I believe people have rights to make choices.
There will be merits and also clashes but I
have been hinting for ways to come up with
solutions.
G: What is your upcoming project?
F: More content and different approaches.
R: Mainly new sound, also new outlets.

Duofox is going on live soon.
U: Establishing a creative space that sell organic fresh beverages, live art being painted
while music is being performed.
R: We have a few music videos coming
soon. Also some collaborative projects with
other Sydney musicians.
G: What is the ultimate goal of Lyfeik?
R: World peace. JOKING.
F: To get the perfect morning coffee that

For real
I would say to innovate
sound and the industry towards something
better and discover new
approaches to do it
ethically. Music has the
power to make culture
pay attention.
doesn’t destroys bowels…

U: WORLD DONIMATION HAHAHAHA.

What is it...

Comics 101
You probably have read a lot of comics in your life,
but do you know how they are made?
Comics writer, Evangelos Androutsopoulos, who
has his works regularly published on VICE magazine
is going to give us a 101 class on comics...through a
comic strip!
Evangelos intentionally left all the pencil lines on raw
scan with no edits, so experience the real deal and enjoy the most natural state of comics!

Background by Evangelos Androutsopoulos

up and coming
Peter bellamy
from nice gallery

Nice Gallery, is currently hosting the works of
Peter Çan Bellamy. Rosa Nussbaum’s brainchild came to life in an effort to re-think the
art scene in Tooting, London. It’s become a
temporary home to a variety of up-and-coming
artists, where they are invited to work for about
a month-long period and afterwards expose
their creations. In order to get to know its
resident artists better, Rosa recently sat down
with Peter for an informative and playful back
and forth.
Rosa Nussbaum: What is your starting point
when creating? What are you interested in?
Peter Bellamy: I don’t know where the work
comes from and I don’t know why I even
want to make art and I don’t know why the
work I make is the work I make. Each thing is
different. Each thing has a different reason, a
different source. I only start to know after I’ve
made it. After I’ve made it I can go OK, that
was because I needed to learn that or I needed
to do that or I needed to get into this position.
Everything interests me.
R: Take the sculptures you showed recently
at the exhibition Demimonde at Amberwood
House. Do you now feel like you are at a point
where you now know why you made those and
what they did for you?
P: I was worried that I couldn’t do absolutely
anything that was in my mind. And I always
thought that you could. That if you think it,
there is some way of making it a reality. I was
worried that I couldn’t do that. I was worried
that I had these ideas, which I didn’t necessarily know where they came from to make these
figurative sculptures ­and doing it showed that
I could.
R: You talked to me before about that original sense of amazement or wonder you get

looking at something beautiful, wondrous or
magical.
P: Yeah, but I think anything can be like that. I
think you can look at anything and feel a sense
of awe about it. And I think it is up to the person looking at a piece. It really has nothing to
do with the artist. Not even art. It’s a decision
you make; you can decide to think about what
you’re looking at and then find what’s beautiful and striking about that thing. Or you can
choose not to.
R: So where does the artist come in?
P: Well with art I suppose it’s the same.

Artists, we’re quite quick
to judge ­we’re quicker to
judge artwork than anyone else. That’s probably
a bad thing because it’s
easier to say you don’t like
something than to take the
time to figure out why you
might like it. You’re not
thinking - the whole point
is to think.
R: If it is the responsibility of the viewers to
find the wonder in the tree or the road sign,
what role do you play as an artist in that relationship? It sounds like you’re not there.
P: I’m not there. That [pointing at his painting]
is not me. That is just something I have made.
R: Can you think of a piece of art that did
something for you?

P: I’ll talk about Sean Mullan’s work, because I
think about that piece a lot.
R: The waterfall piece [Wateryeeonabout
(2014)]?

where other artists sit. It’s about the work not
the bits of writing and paper. Brilliantly w
­ ell
done for saying that, when we are literally talking
about a bit of writing that we have to do. I want
out. I’m not even an artist ­I’m a plumber.
R: Thinking of you as Super Mario now.

P: The waterfall piece. I missed it when I first
went through the space. I didn’t even know it
was there and I completely overlooked it. And
then I revisited the space and I noticed it just
standing quietly in the corner. And there was
something...that piece itself was very simple.
It was probably the simplest piece I’ve ever
seen, both conceptually and in its delivery. And
it made me think about Sean first making that
connection between the sound and the image ­
he wasn’t thinking about art, he was thinking
about the world. He noticed something. I keep
thinking about the process behind it ­but really I
don’t care about that. I just feel good that someone noticed that; that someone made that and
that I got to see it.

P: Rosa ­focus. We’re doing an interview.
R: OK. How long have you been in residence
here at Nice Gallery?
P: This is the beginning of my third week. It’s
been good. I have the space for a month and
when I came I wanted to work my arse off just
to demonstrate my appreciation because it’s a
rare opportunity to be afforded such space to
work in.
R: You’ve really made use of it. You really have
worked hard.
P: Yeah?

R: What have you been looking at?
R: Yeah.
P: I was looking at Draper’s Lament for Icarus.
I mean formally it’s very sort of Matisse. I think
about maybe two or three big works. I think
about Picasso’s dancers a lot. You know the
three very tall abstract colourful dancers. I think
about them a lot. But maybe that’s not the point.
I mean couldn’t you say that the egg I had for
breakfast informs my practice? Where does it
stop? It’s not for me to say where my practice
sits. I never listen to other people when they say

P: So I can stop now?
R: No.

Alright...Well I’m really enjoying it and I think
that it’s a great opportuniP:

ty. I get to share this with
some other great artists.
I’m really happy to be on
the bill.
R: Tell me more about what you’re making at
the moment.
P: Paintings. I’m making paintings. Oil paintings.
At the moment there are two large two-by-two
metre oil paintings. They are figurative. They are
quite...I’m trying not to sound like a dick here ­
they are definitely some of the most exciting
things I have worked on.
R: How has your practice changed since you
graduated in July?
P: I was making a lot of film work and I was
making figurative sculpture ­sort of faux Giacometties ­and that was fun. For the whole three
years I stopped ­I didn’t paint.
R: Those being your three years at university?
P: No, those were my three years on the international space station!
R: Zero g painting!
P: I only painted before I went to university.
That was basically all I did. I did a bit of sculpture as well. I just painted and drew. I completely pushed it aside for university because I
decided instead of choosing the painting course
I chose the film and print course as a way of
pushing myself, trying something different.
I applied with a portfolio full of paintings ­classical stuff. I really wanted to get away from that
and work with film and digital media, which is
what I did for three years. I was always making

sculpture but I just completely stopped painting
other than a few family gifts ­fruit bowls, flowers.
Since graduating I didn’t have anywhere to live.
When you don’t have a space to work in, you
can really only make small work. I couldn’t make
massive figurative sculptures like I used to. I
couldn’t always film and show with projectors ­
but I could draw. And so I drew. And I made
watercolours and I got back into using my wrist
for painting. I took my thumb out of my arse
and started painting. And this [points at his
work] is just a continuation of that. I’m coming
back to painting. It’s a fucking nightmare.
R: Painting?
P: Yeah. It’s like fighting someone every day.
Because at first it was very unfamiliar and I had
to get used to how paint acts. And you do y­ ou
fight with it ­it’s fucking irritating. It’s actually
quite annoying. People have this idea ­and maybe
some artists are like that ­they go into the studio
and it’s really fun and they’re making beautiful
work and it’s wonderful. They have queries “oh,
I don’t know about that” but that’s the extent of
their troubles. But I feel like every single mark I
make is...yeah, is just agony.
R: Where are you going from here ­after you’ve
had your show on the 19th of January, which
everyone should come to!
P: I’m trying to build a studio with my bare
hands, on the land [referring to a plot of land
that he owns], along with a few friends. So I’m
literally building a studio, so that I can make big
works again. I’m going to carry on painting.
R: And in the long run? Do you want to do an
MA?
P: I’d love to go to the RA. That’s the dream.

MOVie review

under
the skin
By David Madsen

Under The Skin (2013), Film 4 and BFI. Directed by Jonathan Glazer. Imgur.com

There are a lot of apt
comparisons to make to the 2014
experimental movie Under the
Skin, directed by Jonathan Glazer
and starring Scarlett Johansson.
The plot involves an alien taking
the form of a beautiful woman,
seducing and killing single men
in the urban areas of Scotland
while slowly trying to figure out
both her identity and sexuality.
This plot description
makes it sound almost identical
to the 1995 sci-fi thriller Species.
However, whereas Species was
a brass, dumb, somewhat misogynistic (though that may be
reading too much into things)
vehicle for getting the positively
stunning Natasha Henstringe to
get her tits out, Under the Skin
is a slow paced, methodical look
into such themes as loneliness,
human compassion (or lack
thereof), identity and attraction.
And while Species was
a glossy mess lacking any style
or substance, Under the Skin’s
fantastic cinematography, chilling

soundtrack and disturbing imagery makes it kin to David Lynch’s
eerie masterpiece Eraserhead
more than the sleazy soft-core
thrillers of the late 80’s to mid
90’s, such as Basic Instinct, Fatal
Attraction or the aforementioned
Species which all followed a ‘dangerous’ woman, seducing and
killing off bachelors.

tentious’ scenes have to do with
the aliens and the environment
they inhabit - something that
we as humans obviously aren’t
able to comprehend. Even so, if
you’re watching this film because
you heard that Scarlett Johansson
is nude in it, one; she is and she
is gorgeous and two; boy are you
in over your head.

The film never gets quite
as unexplainably weird as Eraserhead, and the comparison is
more superficial than anything
else. This is a good thing as many
art house films in the past have
tried and failed to recapture David Lynch’s particular flavour for
the weird and otherworldly.

See you have to keep
one thing in mind: This review is
meant mostly as a recommendation for one of the most unique,
idiosyncratic movies I’ve seen
since, well, since Eraserhead.

While the film goes without dialogue for long stretches
at a time, even the most inexplicable scenes in the film never
seem to come without context
or purpose to the general plot or
the arch of Scarlet Johansson’s
character. Rather a lot of the
weird and what some misguided
folks would no doubt call ‘pre-

It is also however, a
warning: Under the Skin is not
for everyone - most certainly
not for people who just want
to stare at Johansson’s exposed
lady parts. And I don’t mean that
as some goofy trailer to a bad
horror film warning the audience

“THIS MOVIE
IS NOT FOR THE
SOFT OF HEART
that,

OR FAINT OF
STOMACH.” No, I

mean this film left me disturbed,
at times during the film in utter
shock and I truly believe that
the film will offend some people
deeply.
This shock value doesn’t
come in the form of superficial
body horror or jump scares, but
instead in psychological terror
and horrifying imagery. That’s
mostly due to the first half
of the film, which has Scarlet
Johansson drive around in a van,
seducing single men, leading
them into a pitch black room
with the promise of sex and
then, as they get undressed, slowly watches them descend into a
black emptiness.
This process is, as I
stated before, almost identical
to Species, but what makes it
disturbing is that the aforementioned bachelors aren’t ‘in on it,’
at least not while they are being
seduced. See these aren’t scripted

scenarios; Johansson improvises
them and the men whom she
picks up weren’t actually informed they were in a film before
they were seduced. Of course
the part where they get killed off
and some of the more gruesome,
exploitative scenes in the film
are staged, but because the lead
up to these scenes are actually
occurring as they would in real

the film takes on
a horrifying dimension of believability,
that makes the exploitative scenes…
well to be frank…
fucking horrifying
and in some ways
incredibly offensive.
life,

One of these scenes gets
particularly nasty when Johansson coldly gazes out at sea, while
a diver unsuccessfully tries to

save a couple from drowning. As
the diver comes to shore, ready
to pass out from exhaustion,
she breaks his skull with a rock,
pulls him into her van and leaves
the couples’ infant child on the
beach, crying, unable to escape
the coming tidal waves.
Another scene, and the
one that will probably make or
break this movie for you depending on your reaction to it, has
one of Johansson’s male victims
literally pop like a balloon. That
may sound silly and to some it
will probably come off as such.
However, the setup for the scene
in question, the execution and
suddenness of it and the leering
shots of the deflated human
body, is so believable and so out
of left field. I’ve not had a particular scene affect me so deeply
since the end scene to Peter Greenaways The Cook, the Thief, his
Wife & her Lover, which features
a man forced to eat his enemies’
cooked corpse.

There are even more of

the above mentioned scenes ilk
in the film and if that turns you
off, I completely respect that.
The films use of horrific imagery
– such as a drowning baby – to
get a response from the audience,
isn’t necessarily justified by the
overall narrative and so these
scenes can come off as needlessly shocking. In other words, the
primary goal of these scenes is to
offend you through emotions of
shock and horror, not to progress the narrative and so they
can be said to be exploitative and
unnecessary.
This would be true if
it wasn’t because the scenes
in question are juxtaposed to
events of the second half of
the movie, where Scarlet Johansson slowly tries to conform
to human norms and join our
society. In

other words,
her character tries
to transform from
something inhuman,

to something closer
to human. Because of the

first half we know this is not
possible, we as an audience know
how futile this sudden desire of
hers is, because of the abject
inhumanity and emotionless
state that is a core part of her
being and on full display in the
first half of the film. This makes
her attempts and failings to do
rudimentary things such as eating
chocolate cake or elicit basic human emotion all the more tragic.
It also gives an incredible outside
perspective into both the very
best but especially the very worst
of male behaviour towards women in her progressing interaction
with human society.

And that’s the thing

about Under the Skin. The

inhumanity shown in
the first half of the
film, the literal destruction of a male

body which is shown
in explicit detail, the
infant who drowns
off-screen and Johansson seducing
real life, actual dudes
only to have them
drown in darkness
is all fucking abhorrent. But it makes her character’s attempts at understanding
and gaining (so to speak) humanity in the latter half of the
film all the more sweet and her
ultimate failing to do so all the
more tragic. Scarlett Johansson’s
mesmerising performance, the
eerie soundtrack and stunning
work with contrasts and lighting only helps to emphasise this
point.